05 May 2010

Electoral Roulette

Hopefully tomorrow people will vote for a change to our voting system. To do that, people have to second-guess how others will vote in their constituency. It is an imprecise art but we can narrow down the choices.

The 56 critical seats to vote Labour that will stop a Tory majority and allow the Libs a choice of coalition partner are listed below.

Vote Lib Dem elsewhere except in Brighton Pavilion where the best anti-Tory choice is Green.

Labour winning all the following seats will NOT stop the Tories becoming the largest party, but will stop the Tories getting over 300 seats and being able to block electoral reform.

The criteria I have used is that where the Tories are below 30% I have given them no chance of winning the seat. Except in Brighton Pavilion where there is a four way split this is a pretty good guide. I have also written off 85 Labour seats as already lost to the Tories. This sadly includes Hove and Brighton Kemptown.

Vote LABOUR in the following critical 56 seats if you want to stop the Tories getting over 300 seats:

1.Dover 2.Reading West

3.Portsmouth North4.Plymouth Sutton & Devonport

5.Tooting6.Ealing North7.Feltham & Heston

8.Dagenham & Rainham9.Harrow West10.Brent North

11.Gloucester12.Kingswood

13.Thurrock

14.Luton North15.Norwich North16.Ipswich17.Waveney

18.Vale of Clwyd19.Newport West20.Gower21.Bridgend22.Delwyn23.Clwyd South24.Cardiff West

The Telegraph is reporting that the Tories are just 14 seats short. Unhelpfully they don't list these seats, but we can guess they are ones on the above list.

Whatever happens on election night, it is going to be a pretty miserable time for anti-Tories like myself as Tory gain after Tory gain rolls in. Even if we have the last laugh and the Tories fall just short of a majority, unless Labour win nearly all these 56 seats, it is unlikely that the Lib Dems and Labour will have enough seats to stop the Tories forming a minority government. On 7th May we will have to watch over a hundred Tory gains if that happens. Horrible!